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SDK » History » Version 58

Denis 'GNUtoo' Carikli, 01/31/2023 12:39 AM
Update the situation

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h1. SDK
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{{toc}}
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h2. Introduction
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The Android SDK as released by Google is distributed under a non-free license and suggests installing non-free plug-ins such as the Google APIs.
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Replicant 4.2 and earlier provided its own SDK, built from source. The [[ReplicantSDK]] page holds a list of the previously released Replicant SDK builds.
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With Replicant 6.0, Replicant didn't invest time into releasing an SDK since several FSF certified distributions already shipped an Android 6.0 compatible SDK. The associated "blog post":https://blog.replicant.us/2017/04/there-wont-be-a-replicant-6-0-sdk-because-there-is-already-something-better/ has more details about this choice.
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After Android 6.0 there isn't any good enough solutions yet.
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h2. GNU/Linux distributions
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The following FSF certified distributions have Android SDKs:
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| Distribution         | Gradle version  | Android versions   |
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| PureOS amber         | 4.4.1           | 6.0 (API Level 23) |
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| Trisquel 9 (etiona)  | 3.4.1           | 6.0 (API Level 23) |
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| Trisquel 10 (nabia)  | 4.4.1           | 6.0 (API Level 23) |
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At the time of writing, Guix, Hyperbola, Parabola don't have an SDK, and the other FSF certified distributions weren't checked but are unlikely to have packages for an Android SDK.
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The following distributions are also known to have an Android SDK:
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| Distribution         | Gradle version  | Android versions   |
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| Debian  9 (stretch)  | 3.2.1           | 6.0 (API Level 23) |
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| Debian 10 (buster)   |                 |                    |
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| Debian 11 (bullseye) | 4.4.1           | 6.0 (API Level 23) |
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The [[F-DroidAndApplications]] wiki page also has information on attempts to build Android packages with these SDKs.
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h2. Attempts to go further than Android 6.0
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At some point there was an Android Rebuilds project that provided free SDKs at https://android-rebuilds.beuc.net/ but the author mentions that the project ended in 2021[1]. 
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That project also lacked a license. That led "another project by wchen342":https://github.com/wchen342/android-rebuilds to restart from scratch. 
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Wchen342's reimplementation is tested ungoogled-chromium-android and uses debian 12 (bookworm) through docker. It might be possible to use PureOS instead when the equivalent PureOS version is released.
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F-Droid also has a "forum post":https://forum.f-droid.org/t/call-for-help-making-free-software-builds-of-the-android-sdk/4685 that asks for help with that as they currently rely on the nonfree SDKs and they want to fix that.
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fn1. "Android Rebuilds, how to rebuild SDK/NDK, precisely, without non-free EULA (2015-2021)" on https://www.beuc.net/
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h2. Replicant SDK
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See [[ReplicantSDKUsage]] for more details about SDKs up to Replicant 4.2.